Daily Report – 9/4/25
Yankees
Last night in Houston, the Yankees lost 8-7 to the Astros. The loss happened for two distinct reasons:
The Yankees’ bullpen couldn’t hold things down in a close game.
The umpires made it impossible for the Yankees to win.
Part 1: Bullpen Ineffectiveness
Will Warren had a decent start for the Yankees, allowing two runs on five hits across five innings. In the fifth inning, his energy began to dwindle, and the Astros made hard contact against his pitches, leading to their first run of the game. After the Yankees added a run during the top of the sixth inning to increase their lead to 4-1, Warren needed to regain his composure in the bottom of the frame. But he couldn’t do that, and on the first pitch of the inning, Jeremy Peña took him deep on a hanging sweeper. Fernando Cruz came out of the bullpen in relief, but he gave up another run to cut Houston’s deficit to 4-3.
After an offensively silent top half of the seventh inning, Luke Weaver faltered in the bottom half. With two outs, he walked Jeremy Peña to put runners at first and second base, which meant he had to face the red-hot Yordan Alvarez, who made him pay with a game-tying single to left field. The Yankees went down in order again in the top of the eighth inning, and with a tie game in the bottom of the eighth, manager Aaron Boone chose the struggling Devin Williams to relieve Luke Weaver.
Williams first faced Carlos Correa, who was sitting on his changeup throughout the at-bat, before Williams offered a high fastball, and Correa drilled it the opposite way for a double. After that, Williams couldn’t locate his changeup against Jesús Sánchez, who worked a walk to put runners at first and second for Yainer Diaz. It took nine pitches for Williams to strike out Diaz, and it took six more for him to load the bases by walking Christian Walker. He then managed to strike out Ramón Urías, but when the nine-spot hitter Taylor Trammell brought his .200 batting average to the plate, he worked a five-pitch walk to bring Correa home.
“Credit to [the Astros],” Aaron Boone. “They had a lot of really good at-bats against us; we didn’t get a couple of calls, and it got away.”
Indeed, the Astros played a better game than the Yankees, but there was no justifiable reason for Boone to use Williams in another high-leverage situation. Williams has struggled all season in high-leverage spots, and he has become one of baseball’s most predictable pitchers this season, offering merely a changeup and a fastball. Although Williams’ changeup is elite – and sometimes it makes him look elite – it has become much easier to hit because he cannot locate it like he used to.
After walking Trammell, Williams’s night was over. On his way off the mound, he got ejected for arguing balls and strikes with home plate umpire Brian Walsh. Camilo Doval – the hard-throwing trade deadline acquisition who has been disappointing for the Yankees since he came over from San Francisco – relieved Williams. With the bases loaded and his team down 5-4, he quickly allowed an RBI single to Jeremy Peña before balking to score Christian Walker and throwing a wild pitch to plate Trammell. The score was 8-4 Astros.
The Yankees managed to rally in the top of the ninth inning. Ryan McMahon and Aaron Judge both singled before Cody Bellinger hit a three-run home run to cut Houston’s lead to just one run. But it wasn’t enough, as Jazz Chisholm Jr. got punched out on strikes, which meant Giancarlo Stanton – who hit a sky-scraping home run in the second inning but made a costly error in the seventh – didn’t get another at-bat. Stanton’s poor throw helped Yordan Alvarez drive in the game-tying run in the seventh inning, and it was unfortunate he didn’t get the opportunity to erase it in the ninth with his bat.
Part 2: The Umpire Empire
The first reason why the Yankees lost last night was that they played sloppy baseball and couldn’t throw enough effective pitches. The second reason they lost was because of the umpires, particularly home plate umpire Brian Walsh. He was not prepared for the intensity of Yankees-Astros, and his performance behind the plate was a manifestation of the issues Major League Baseball has with umpires.
Let’s rewind to that eighth inning, after Houston had come back to tie the score at four, and Devin Williams was on the mound for the Yankees. Bullpen decisions aside, he did give up a double to Carlos Correa, but against Jesús Sánchez, Walsh incorrectly called Williams’ third pitch of the at-bat, which should have changed the count to 1-2 instead of 2-1. The 1-1 count is baseball’s most crucial, and given how much Williams has struggled this season, it’s no surprise he ultimately walked Sánchez. Two batters later, against Christian Walker, Walsh missed a couple of borderline strike calls. Not long after, against Taylor Trammell, Walsh missed two key strike calls, including the final pitch of the at-bat, which resulted in a run-scoring walk.
As Williams departed the mound, he called out to Walsh, “You missed four!” And for that, Williams received his first career ejection. “I said, ‘I had four that you missed,’ and he threw me out for it,” said Williams. “Never been ejected in my career.”
As Aaron Boone walked back to the dugout after relieving Williams, Walsh was glaring at him, and Boone muttered something under his breath. Although Walsh likely couldn’t hear it, he ejected Boone as well. Walsh baited the Yankees manager into that ejection, which, understandably, provoked him. Boone then began arguing with Walsh on the mound about his strike zone. He told Walsh that he stunk, and then told crew chief Adrian Johnson and third-base umpire Ramon De Jesus the same thing.
It took so little for both Williams and Boone to get ejected. Any backtalk – even if an umpire can’t hear it – seems to lead to an ejection.
“When you’re making good pitches, which I was, not getting those calls really changes the course of an at-bat,” said Williams. “Obviously, Correa hit the double, so I kind of had my back against the wall right away. Made some really good pitches to Sánchez, which [Walsh] missed two in that at-bat. You just keep going, right? But at the end of the day, that changes outcomes. I should have had Sánchez 0-2 instead of 2-1.”
Things then got worse for the Yankees. As soon as Camilo Doval arrived at the mound, he began experiencing issues with his PitchCom device. After Jeremy Peña extended Houston’s lead with a single off Doval, the pitcher balked and threw a wild pitch for Houston to score two more runs. PitchCom issues aside, examining Brian Walsh’s angle of Doval’s balk, it was highly unlikely he could have even seen the disengagement. Doval has been called for balks before during his short Yankees tenure, and most of them have been called correctly, but there was no tangible sign here that Walsh saw Doval move in such a way that insinuated he was balking.
“It’s amazing how much I ask for that balk call and never get it screaming from the [dugout],” said Boone after the game.
Furthermore, after the game, Austin Wells said he felt the strike zone changed at some point during the game, and he added, “With Camilo, he doesn’t speak great English. We only have one PitchCom that really works with just Spanish. The umpires seemed to not – I don’t know if he didn’t care or what the deal was, but he said he gave us a chance to fix it the first time we went out there and then decided it was a disengagement. We were trying to explain to him our case. He said we were lucky we didn’t get a violation and that it was just a step off [the mound].”
So, not only did Brian Walsh have a poor game behind the plate, but he also directly interfered with the game’s outcome. An umpire is an official. Their job is to be impartial toward the teams on the field. Walsh had no right to deny the Yankees to right to help Doval fix his PitchCom device, especially if they explicitly told him that it was the only PitchCom device Doval could use. After Brad Ausmus – who took over as manager after Boone’s ejection –spoke with the umpires about Brian Walsh’s call against Doval, Adrian Johnson physically shooed him off the field.
After the Yankees rallied in the top of the ninth, Jazz Chisholm Jr. got the bat taken out of his hands as Walsh called strike three against him on an outside slider. The pitch didn’t look like a strike, but he called it anyway.
“It’s just ridiculous,” said Devin Williams, “to have the inning that I had and then Jazz got the bat taken out of his hands on a pitch that was a lot further from the zone than pitches I was making.”
Chisholm was furious with Walsh, and he argued with him, but there was nothing he could do. Walsh had won the battle. He had earned the upper hand. But that, right there, is the issue with baseball umpires. They are too involved with the outcomes of baseball games. This trend feels particularly prevalent across baseball right now because umpires realize that robots are coming to replace them soon, but that is no excuse. Umpires, and not the players, are dictating baseball games.
That’s not baseball. Not the kind I root for.
Tonight, at 7:40 PM (6:40 PM CDT), the Yankees will try to bounce back and take this series from Houston (YES). LHP Carlos Rodón (15-7, 3.18 ERA) will toe the slab for the Yankees against RHP Christian Javier (1-1, 3.38 ERA). Javier has been great against the Yankees for the last few years, and Aaron Judge is hitless in 13 career at-bats against him. Javier holds a 1.99 ERA in six career regular-season appearances against the Yankees.
Here is tonight’s starting lineup for the New York Yankees:
CF Trent Grisham (L)
1B Ben Rice (L)
DH Aaron Judge (C) (R)
RF Cody Bellinger (L)
LF Giancarlo Stanton (R)
2B Jazz Chisholm Jr. (L)
C Austin Wells (L)
SS Anthony Volpe (R)
3B Ryan McMahon
SP: LHP Carlos Rodón (15-7, 3.18 ERA)
Schedule
7:00 PM (6:00 PM CDT): Primetime at the US Open, 2025 Women’s Singles Semifinals; Arthur Ashe Stadium; ESPN
First Semifinal: A. Sabalenka [1] vs. J. Pegula [4]
Second Semifinal: N. Osaka [23] vs. A. Anisimova [8]
7:40 PM (6:40 PM CDT): NYY at HOU; YES; SP: LHP Carlos Rodón (15-7, 3.18 ERA)
8:20 PM (7:20 PM CDT): 2025 NFL Season Kickoff – Dallas Cowboys at Philadelphia Eagles; NBC, Peacock
7:00 PM (6:00 PM CDT): Football Night in America (FNIA) – NFL Kickoff 2025; NBC, Peacock
